Monthly Archives: January 2010

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We had a great turnout for the first ever Central Carolina 9 Ball Classic at Gate City Billiards Club in Greensboro, NC. 51 players entered the event, many local but many from out of state, all seeking the promised $1,500 minimum 1st prize. It drew a strong field of players including, BJ Ussery, Scott Lewis, Tony Morrison, Eddie Little, Derek Leonard, Jeff Pruitt, and many more.

This was a one day single elimination event with a race to 9 in all but the final which had a race to 11. The tournament started at 2:00 EST Saturday, January 23rd and ended just before midnight.

Eddie Little out lasted BJ Ussery in the finals to take home the 1st place prize, a total of $2,000 (purse plus auction). BJ walked away with $1,000 total prize money for 2nd place.

Below are the results:

In the quarter finals (Losers won $110 each):

Adam Stanton defeated Paul Mullins 9 to 7

Eddie Little defeated Scott Lewis 9 to 6

Bob Strandburg defeated Sidney Champion 9 to 6

BJ Ussery defeated Jason Hayward 9 to 8

In the semi finals (Losers won $500 total each):

Eddie Little defeated Adam Stanton 9 to 8

BJ Ussery defeated Bobby Strandburg 9 to 2

In the finals (BJ earned $1,000 total and Eddie won $2,000 total):

Eddie Little defeated BJ Ussery 11 to 9

Sponsoring this event was:

Southeast Tech Fore (Mike Orrell) $1,000 towards purse

Gate City Billiards Club (Don Liebes) $500 towards purse

Sign Language (Tommy Lyles) provided t-shirts for all of the participants

Seven Former Champs in Vegas Line Up

MATCHROOM Sport can announce the players who have been invited to compete in the 2010 PartyPoker.net World Pool Masters.

After 17 years as a 16-player invitational competition, the Masters, one of the longest established tournaments in pool, will now feature 64 players and take place over five days instead of three.

Once again, the Masters, which will be held from Wednesday, May 12 to Sunday, May 16, will take place at the Riviera Hotel and Casino, Las Vegas, Nevada.

Working in conjunction with Cuesports International, the Masters takes place during the annual BCA National 8-Ball Championships, which sees thousands of players and fans flock to the Riviera for a lengthy festival of pool.

The 64-player line-up will comprise 32 international stars of the game from around the world and they will be joined 32 qualifiers who will have won through events across the globe in the run up to the main event in May.

There will be more female players in the Masters than ever before with England’s Allison Fisher, Korea’s Yu Ram Cha and Austria’s Jasmin Ouschan set to make the trip to Vegas.

No American player has won the Masters since Earl Strickland triumphed in 1997 but a large contingent from the USA – Johnny Archer, Corey Deuel, Oscar Dominguez, Dennis Hatch, Rodney Morris, John Schmidt, Shane Van Boening and Charlie Williams – will be hoping to change that statistic.

The qualifying events, collectively known as ‘The Race to Vegas’, will be getting underway soon with the first qualifier in Paris on Sunday, February 14.

After that, the events come thick and fast with tournaments scheduled from as far afield as Australia, Japan, USA, Canada as well as most of the major European countries.

The first two days of the main event in May feature double elimination play on a multi-table set-up as the field reduces from 64 down to 32.

The event then goes to single elimination and the last 16 is played out in a single table arena setting in front of the TV cameras, culminating in the final on the evening of Sunday, May 16.

Television is produced by Matchroom Sport and will be seen as 15 x one hour programmes in 14 countries around the world with more to be added to the list.

The prize fund is set at a guaranteed $100,000 with $20,000 going to the eventual champion.

Notes: Matchroom Sport are one of the world’s leading producers of televised sport and are responsible for over 1,100 hours of original programming across a range of nine sports. Based in the UK and chaired by charismatic founder Barry Hearn, the World Pool Masters is one of a stable of pool events that include the World Cup of Pool and the Mosconi Cup.

The 2010 World Pool Masters is sponsored by PartyPoker.net. Tables are supplied by Brunswick Billiards, cloth by Iwan Simonis, Super Aramith balls by Saluc and the Official Cue is Predator.